thoughtfulBecause Deadline doesn't have a proper ending, and they don't want to encourage this behavior from publishers.
Okay. Look: if your definition of "proper ending" is "the story is over, and I can walk away satisfied and never need to read another volume," then no, Deadline doesn't have a proper ending. I have often said that the only time it's appropriate to end on a cliffhanger is in the second book of a trilogy, and Deadline ends on a pretty major cliffhanger. I can't apologize for that. It's the nature of the trilogy structure that part two will often end on a cliffhanger, and is allowed to do so. I don't end series books on cliffhangers; the Toby books, and the InCryptid books, all have solid, closed endings. I try to make sure there's always more story, but you can still walk away if you need to. This book is not those books.
Let me be clear: Deadline has an ending. There is a point where it ceases to be Deadline, and becomes Blackout, and that point is where the book ends. The Newsflesh trilogy is three books long, and those books are intrinsically linked, but each of them begins, and ends, at a certain place. The thrust and mood and structure of each volume is different, and when you pick up Blackout, you'll be reading a very different book, even if Deadline ended with some pretty major questions unanswered. I didn't pick that end point arbitrarily. I picked it because that was where the story of Deadline ended, and the story of Blackout began.
I completely understand and appreciate frustration over unanswered questions, unfinished measures, and endings that don't appear to end. And I also understand why some people have chosen to buy Deadline and put it on the shelf to wait for Blackout. I wrote back to the person who emailed me and said that I was sorry, I hadn't done it to increase sales or because my publisher made me; I ended the story where I did because that was where the story ended. And I stand by that.
Deadline may not have a "proper" ending.
But it has the right one.
June 14 2011, 00:40:09 UTC 6 years ago
I hadn't read the LOTR books before I saw the first movie, and while I knew going into the theater that it was the first of a trilogy, I was still surprised that the movie ended before Frodo had finished his quest.
Even some one-off books leave the reader with more questions than answers. Yes, most endings tie up all the loose strings but not all.
Sometimes it's better that way.
Like the movie Lost in Translation. It wouldn't be the same movie if we knew what Bob whispered in Charlotte's ear at the end.
If Blackout doesn't have "proper ending," I'll be disappointed but I'll understand that that's what your muse (or the Masons) told you to do.
BTW, I may have gotten my youngest brother interested in Feed. I'll lend him my paper copy this weekend. It's certainly a big step up from the last book he read, Dan Brown's latest. :-)
June 14 2011, 02:13:25 UTC 6 years ago